On this blog, I -- John Lofland, jlofland@dcn.org -- report on social life and organization in the Old North area of Davis, California sub specie aeternitatis.

Wednesday, May 3, 2017

Old North Residents Ask the City to Implement At Least Part of the 2012 Traffic Calming Plan (257)

1. Davis Enterprise, February 12, 2012

In
a letter to the City Council dated April 30, 2017, the ONDNA Board presses
forward on the long-stalled effort to implement at least a scaled-down version of the 2012 plan for Old North
traffic calming -- a plan created by Alta Planning and Design under contract
with and at the request of the City.

ONDNA
President Marilyn Underwood signs the letter that is reproduced below in
graphics numbers 3, 4, and 5.*

The
letter speaks for itself quite cogently and I only want to introduce it with
some modest context, which includes (full disclosure) my own advocacy in this
matter.

In
2011 and 2102, the City carried out a process of engaging Old North area (and
other 5th Street proximate) residents on the topic of neighborhood traffic
calming. This process was led by Davis City planners, conducted by professional
planners from Alta Planning and Design, and involved face-to-face resident
engagement (a moment of which is seen in graphic 1).

I
was among those “engaged” and I reported on the process in this blog at that
time, which can be read in post #108 and consists most importantly of an article in the Davis
Enterprise on February 12, 2012:

The
process resulted in a wonderful plan, which is depicted in a large-scale
graphic available in this blog’s post #245, February 20, 2015, and titled
“Graphic of the Alta Old North Traffic Calming Plan:“

As described in President Underwood's letter, the
City has been slow to move ahead on what seems a wonderful plan. Among other
places, this slowness is displayed in “A
City of Davis View of the Alta Old North Traffic Calming Plan" (post #246,
February 20, 2015):

But,
to their credit, ONDNA members and supporters persist and are resurgent, albeit seeming to be willing to settle at the moment for far less than the plan as proposed by Alta.

One
of the important reasons for the renewed effort is the ironic downside of the
success of the 5th Street redesign. At the same time that the redesign has
calmed 5th Street traffic, it has caused people impatient with no
longer being able to race on 5th increasingly to “cut through” various Old
North streets in order to avoid perceived slow-traffic points. For example, I live on E and I
have noticed that people heading south on F Street wanting to turn right onto
5th sometimes turn right on 7th or 6th and then left onto E
or D on their way to 5th. By doing this, they avoid the wait at the F & 5th
intersection. The same thing applies in the other direction. This results in an
uncomfortable number of cars barreling along at high speeds on E and D between
5th and 7th.

The
same and other dangerous dynamics are seen with regard to cars on other streets
and President Underwood helpfully details some of these in her letter, as well
as including a number of dramatic pictures showing a few of the crash-up
consequences.

Ironically,
this upsurge in Old North traffic problems makes the 2012 plan more relevant
and pressing than it was in the year it was created. It appears that the creators
of the plan anticipated increased Old North traffic troubles.

3. ONDNA letter to Council asking action on the Alta traffic calming plan

4.

5.

___________* The letter is also available online at a public ONDNA Google Drive, which can be reached by means of this URL: